Isn’t life strange ? One day you’re trying to erase Berlin, another you’re trying to save its people.
North by Northwest on this Dan Bell report. I can see what Mr Bell is trying to do – the human side and all that. But a little context would be in order – maybe a little about why Stalin was trying to “expel the Western powers from the city” – aka “starving its inhabitants”. Maybe the words “Communist” or “Union of Soviet Socialist Republics” might put in an appearance here and there.
(Surprisingly for the PC BBC, Mr Bell’s cheery account of Hamburg brothels, black markets and the ‘hedonistic post-war atmosphere‘ misses out the important contributing fact that, while historians differ over the degree of starvation and the number of deaths incurred, it is accepted that post-war Germany was extremely short of food and fuel – a condition exacerbated by the harsh winter of 1946-47.)
NNW asks – and rightly so – what effect this lack of context, repeated again and again, does to a British people with a dumbed-down history curriculum, and overseas readers for whom the BBC is their window on British culture :
“… think how this is being read in Islamabad and Cairo, in Ankara and Nigeria, in the Caribbean and in mill-workers’ cottages in Leeds and Burnley where 1066 is never mentioned, and in Halifax, West Yorkshire and in curry houses in downtown Halifax Nova Scotia. What impression will this give to people who don’t grow up with the perspective and (limited) historical knowledge that The Great Escape and Tora Tora Tora and Kelly’s Heroes and Schindler’s List provide ?”
Having read David Bell’s report, it could have been worse. Yes there was no real context as to why Stalin might have wished to expel his erstwhile Allies from Berlin but, after all, this is the BBC. The fact that Bell actually named the culprits here (contrast with the endless BBC reporting on criminal perps of no appearance – unless they’re white and/or Christian) makes this report more or less impartial. The interesting point is that this is not a report on a proud moment in our history, it’s put out as a “human interest” story where the “history” (probably because it’s to our credit) is of secondary importance.
This is a familiar BBC tactic. Abolition of the slave trade was not reported or treated as a creditable episode for Britain. No – the BBC chose to dwell on the evils of the slave trade. Furthermore the BBC ignored the vital contribution to the trade of the African slave traders who provided the trade’s raw material and the continuing existence of slavery where Islamic regimes rule. This continues as no mention of Bristol or Liverpool (unless it concerns those lovable scallies whose sense of humour is famous throughout . . er . . . Liverpool) is complete without a reference to those cities’ propserity as stemming from involvement in slavery.
“Abolition of the slave trade was not reported or treated as a creditable episode for Britain”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/abolition/royal_navy_article_01.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/abolition/abolitionists_gallery_01.shtml
Anonymous
As you are only too well aware, the BBC sneaking into a little used corner of its information warehouse something vaguely contrary to its usual take, does not constitute impartiality (except as a line of defence for the BBC and its apologists). I am sure that somewhere on the BBC website is a page which might imply that the MMGW warmists may have over-egged their pudding. The vast majority of the front-line (ie talking and viewing) BBC output on the anniversary of slave trade abolition portrayed Britain as a country unapologetic about its past involvement in slave trading and that the abolition as too little, too late and now requiring endless apologies (verbal and financial) to the descendants of the slaves.
As I read this post, and in particular, the point about starvation in post-war Germany, I couldn’t imagine Vance or Sue writing it. How right I was!